Jing-Xuan Lim, Virginia M. S. Ruetten @vmsruetten.bsky.social , Anuththara Rupashinge, Martin Haesemeyer, Brett D. Mensh, Mark C. Fishman, Florian Engert @engertlab.bsky.social , Behtash Babadi, Jiulin Du #Neuroscience

This work was truly a team effort—deeply grateful to our collaborators and co-authors for contributions spanning experiments, modeling, transgenics, analysis, and interpretation. Grateful to: Javier J. How, Michele Nardin, Sujatha Narayan, Amina Kinkhabwala, Weiyu Chen @weiyuchen2025.bsky.social ,

Grateful to be part of this team led by David Prober and Misha Ahrens @mishaahrens.bsky.social . Rongwei Zhang and Ziqiang Wei @zqwei.bsky.social are both on the job market this year and happy to connect.

Silencing either the noradrenergic neurons or astroglial signaling disrupted these hypoxia-coping behaviors, while activation evoked them.

Mechanistically, we identify a noradrenergic neuron–astroglia circuit behind this. NE-MO neurons directly sense brain hypoxia and receive motor efference copies; astroglia integrate that signal and forecast hypoxic stress ~8 s before O2 falls. #Astrocytes #Neuroscience

Our data support that idea: a predictive control model explained behavior much better than a reactive one. Fish appear to combine current brain O2 with recent swim history to decide when to pause swimming and increase breathing. #ComputationalBiology #Neuroscience

Movement has a delayed oxygen cost. In zebrafish, swimming keeps driving internal hypoxia for seconds after movement ends, suggesting the brain may need to predict O2 debt rather than just react to it. #Neuroscience #Metabolism

How does the brain manage metabolism proactively? We show that a neuron–glia circuit helps zebrafish anticipate the delayed oxygen cost of movement and act before brain O2 drops. Excited to share our preprint on predictive oxygen regulation. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... #Allostasis